


Box Twelve

by sonatine



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, Post-Winter Soldier, journalism style, pre-Civil War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-16
Updated: 2016-06-16
Packaged: 2018-07-15 09:04:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7216216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonatine/pseuds/sonatine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Steve Rogers was lost to the arctic, all of his possessions were passed on to Becca Barnes, who in turn donated them to the U.S. Historical Society -- all except for <i>one sketchbook</i> infamously dubbed 'box twelve.' All anyone could ever do was speculate as to what it contained </p>
<p>Until one morning when a surprise interview with the now-octogenarian Rebecca Barnes-Proctor is glibly uploaded to the blog of one G. Jones</p>
            </blockquote>





	Box Twelve

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Brooklyn Sketchbook](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4973974) by [alby_mangroves](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alby_mangroves/pseuds/alby_mangroves). 



> Two things: I love metafiction and faux-journalistic pieces (i.e. the Not Easily Conquered series or the one about Bucky being put on trial post-WS with all the courtroom sketches -- I forget the name). And the other day I was thinking about all the letters between Alexander Hamilton and John Laurens that Hamilton’s son, John Church Hamilton, released to the public but with heavy redaction: and then the like five letters that he refused to let anyone see. And tbh friends, Hamilton & Laurens’ letters were hella gay, for real, so can you imagine what had been in those particular letters?
> 
> And then I saw [this fanart](http://brooklynsketchbook.tumblr.com/post/144855606664/july-5th-1939) by [brooklynsketchbook](http://brooklynsketchbook.tumblr.com) and all was lost

**Box Twelve** // Vanity Fair / June 30, 2014 /  Staff Writer: Christine Everhart

_pictured below: selection from infamous ‘Box Twelve’ - [1]_ [ _sketch dated July 5, 1939_ ](http://brooklynsketchbook.tumblr.com/post/144855606664/july-5th-1939) _, signed SRogers [2]_ [ _undated sketch_ ](http://brooklynsketchbook.tumblr.com/post/130880064014/even-when-i-had-nothing-i-had-bucky) _(38? - 41?), signed SRogers [3]_ [ _undated sketch_ ](http://brooklynsketchbook.tumblr.com/post/131797847854/hot-day-at-coney-island-he-doesnt-like) _(38? - 41?) signed SRogers_

 

To have said last week that nothing could pull our eyes away from the footage of open warfare on a Washington D.C. bridge would have been a frankly accurate hyperbole.

And now, despite all odds, it is still accurate, for we are all glued to the same footage, but with vastly different intent.

In a surprise drop worthy of Ms. Knowles, history enthusiasts and pop culture junkies alike woke to the 3-minute interview posted on what appeared to be a typical college kid’s blog. Except this blog belongs to one Gabriela Jones, granddaughter of Professor Emeritus (and notable former Howling Commando and participant in the 1963 March on Washington) Gabe Jones — and the lady she is interviewing is none other than Rebecca Barnes-Proctor.

+

For those unaware of Captain America lore, the fabled ‘box twelve’ is, firstly, not a box but a very slim packet containing precisely one sketchbook that belonged to Captain America, back when he was still Steve Rogers and just another aspiring artist in the New York boroughs (if Rogers could ever be described as ‘just another’).

As James “Bucky” Barnes was listed as his next of kin when he was declared MIA in 1945, all of Rogers’ and Barnes’ (MIA, 1944) personal effects were passed onto Winifred Barnes, Bucky’s mother, and eventually Rebecca Barnes-Proctor, his sister, who later donated relevant letters, documents of interest, and, most notably, Rogers’ sketchbooks to the U.S. Historical Society when the good captain was lost to the arctic.

Every decade or so following his disappearance, in a fit of patriotism or desire to invoke the power of ‘the good old days’ onto the current youth of America, a Captain America exhibition would be staged at the Smithsonian. And every decade, a new generation of historians would froth at the mouth in curiosity: for when papers and personal detritus are donated to the Historical Society, there is _protocol_.

There is a very detailed record of items included in the person of interest’s possession in a process such as this; there is also a very detailed record of exactly _which_ of these items were donated and which stayed with the inheritor of their estate.

Every item on the list of Captain Rogers’ possessions was donated to the Historical Society — all except for one packet containing a sketchbook, apparently dated from 1938 to 1941.

Every possible historical fact had been surmised about Rogers’ life at this time. He was living with Barnes, after the death of his mother (and last living relative) in 1938, in various addresses across Brooklyn and working a series of odd jobs until 1941 when Barnes was drafted and Rogers famously underwent Dr. Abraham Erskine’s trial.

There was nothing out of the ordinary about Rogers’ life at this time. Every other piece of information about his life, including private details, had been passed into the hands of the public with alacrity. So what, historians asked themselves, fervently in library cubicles and endless dusty archives, _could have possibly been included in that one sketchbook that Barnes-Proctor didn’t want the American public to see?_

+

This is a very satisfying sentence to write, for we are now all very aware.

Early this morning at 06:00, Gabriela Jones, a senior at Fisk University, uploaded a video onto her personal blog of her interviewing Rebecca Barnes-Proctor in her apartment in Queens, NY. Evidently, two days prior Barnes-Proctor had reached out to Jones, Jones caught a bus up to the city, recorded the interview, returned to Nashville to edit it, and posted it today. The blog received so many simultaneous hits that the webhost crashed and was unavailable for hours afterward.

The video is straightforward: static and trained on Jones and Barnes-Proctor, sitting side-by-side on a sofa, and clearly shot on phone, judging by the standard quality. Jones jumps right in, never looking directly at the camera, but instead focusing her full attention on the octogenarian beside her, “So, Ms. Barnes-Proctor —”

“Oh _lord_ , child, call me Becca, please,” she interrupts, and the two smile at each other like conspirators.

+

There is much to be said about choice here. Barnes-Proctor chose not to donate Box Twelve. Barnes-Proctor chose Gabriela Jones, a college student with zero journalistic ties, to conduct this historic interview.

“Bucky chose to save Steve,” Jones says slowly and clearly to Barnes-Proctor. “And Steve chose to save America. Becca, I cannot tell you how many times my granddad told me that. Every time I was at some crossroads in life, he would say — oh, right, it was Peggy Carter that told Steve this. After —” she pauses. “After Bucky Barnes — fell, Peggy apparently went to find Steve and found him sitting in a bombed-out pub, drinking a bottle of whisky he couldn’t feel—”

(Both women laugh a little here, though both are clearly choked up. “Dramatic as always,” says Barnes-Proctor.)

“And Peggy told him that this had been Barnes’ choice. And to let him have the dignity of that choice.”

So why did Barnes-Proctor, after decades of silence, choose to release Box Twelve now?

“He asked me to,” she says, when Jones asks this question that has been burning in the back of all our minds.

“Who did?” Jones asks.

“Steve Rogers,” Barnes-Proctor says simply.

+

Although we still don’t know the impetus behind Rogers’ sudden decision to fully reveal his personal life to the world now (although nearly dying, again, at the hands of your own government might spur a desire for a clean slate), we finally know the contents of the Captain America Holy Grail.

Confirmed by a series of quite intimate sketches and corroborated by Barnes-Proctor herself, Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes had been in a romantic relationship nearly all of their adult lives.

+

As some of our younger readers might question why Barnes-Proctor would go to such lengths to keep this a secret, it bears revisiting the era in which Rogers and Barnes grew up and even the following decades of aftermath.

Barnes-Proctor held onto Box Twelve throughout McCarthyism and the conformation of the 1950s, during Stonewall and the AIDS crisis, and even after Steve Rogers’ miraculous return to life.

“It wasn’t my secret to share,” she said. “Yet. America hadn’t been ready — yet. America hadn’t matured enough.”

Though this point is debatable given a small but vocal minority of conservative outpouring towards Box Twelve’s Reveal, the overwhelming amount of support and sympathy directed toward Rogers, who remains staunchly unavailable for interview or comment during all this, hopefully confirms the changing tide of bigotry and hatred and instead harkens the acceptance that _love is love —_  a love that is evident in every line of these drawings.  +

**Author's Note:**

> (I am summarily ignoring the CA:CW end credit scene) And then in 2015 _Hamilton_ comes out on Broadway and Steve and Bucky go to see it together and openly sob at ‘Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story’ and Eliza’s legacy, and start a scholarship fund for Women in STEM students and name it after Peggy Carter


End file.
